


In the Still of the Night

by Sterling_Jay



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Could maybe be an M, Dreams, F/F, Misunderstandings, but close enough, not exactly hurt/comfort, to their eventual benefit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-12
Updated: 2016-12-12
Packaged: 2018-09-08 02:25:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8826751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sterling_Jay/pseuds/Sterling_Jay
Summary: Emma wakes Regina from a dream and gets more than she bargained for.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [magicsophicorn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/magicsophicorn/gifts).



Regina moaned long and low, holding Emma's head in place as she licked and sucked. She grasped at her own breast, breath coming out in short pants as Emma looked up at her from below. She could feel the smugness to her smirk even now, her face pressed tightly to Regina's slit.

"Emma..." She hissed as Emma deliberately sucked, her entire body shaking. A twist of Emma's hand had Regina's hips thrusting into the air, Emma pressing them back to the sheets. "Emma..." Her eyes rolled back in her head. "Emma." Another twist of fingers, a flicker of tongue at her clit. "Emma!"

Emma shook her shoulder, kneeling beside the bed. Her eyes were tired and worried in the dim lamp light.

"Regina, are you okay?"

Regina sits up slowly, taking in the state of her room. The sheets are thrown to the floor, or tangled around her body, but she and Emma both have clothes on. Sweat runs down her back and she feels exhaustion right down to her bones, but Emma looks weary without the excitement that comes from sex.

She pulls her hand out from under her own shirt slowly, hoping Emma doesn't notice.

Emma's gaze immediately goes to the hand when it emerges from under the covers, of course, and she reaches for it, Regina reluctantly letting her hold her hand.

"You were dreaming, weren't you?"

Regina looks away, mortified. Of course she'd have a wet dream about Emma, and of course Emma would hear her having said dream.

"Hey. It's no big deal. It," Emma looks mildly uncomfortable, "it happens to all of us sometimes."

"I'm aware," Regina spits, now ashamed and humiliated. It was no surprise that Emma would feel uncomfortable hearing Regina moan her name in the dead of night, how many times had they tried to kill each other? More accurately, how many times had she tried to kill the Savior, only to fail miserably? "You don't need to do this, Miss Swan. We don't need to discuss it."

"Maybe you don't, but I do. I was involved too." She sits on the edge of the bed, lightly pushing at Regina's leg. Regina reluctantly moves to the other side of the bed.

"Fine. But you're doing all the talking."

"Fair enough." Emma leans back against the headboard.

"You seem to be...relatively calm about this."

"I am. Came to terms with it a while back, really." They sit in silence, Regina waiting for...she's not sure. The opening salvo of insults? A gentle apology, followed by a definite but easy let down? "You know what, I lied, I can't do this without a drink."

Regina rolls her eyes as Emma turns to get off the bed. "I hardly think this conversation is so dramatic as to require alcohol, Miss Swan!"

"I meant tea! You've started to convince me of the stuff's magical properties." She glances at Regina. "You want some?"

"Yes, fine, sure, whatever." She waves Emma off, "I don't care what flavor, just go get it so we can get this conversation over with."

She waits until Emma leaves the room to run to her en-suite to quickly rinse away the sweat and the smell of sex that she's sure surrounds her. She doesn't need _that_ on either of their minds during the conversation.

Emma's already back by the time she gets out, tea sitting on each of the nightstands beside the bed.

"So, am I still doing all the talking?" Regina nods, staring into her tea. "Okay," Emma sighs. "If I ask questions to get to the bottom of this, will you nod or shake your head for me?"

Regina shrugs.

"Okay, fine." Another sigh. "This was...because of today, right?" A nod. "Fighting your mother's former army brought it on?"

"Among...other things."

Emma takes her hand, and Regina stares at her, stunned and...upset, frankly. Emma rejecting her angrily would hurt, calmly would be annoying, but to do so kindly, sweetly, tenderly? It's just going to make her fall harder, make her shatter, instead of simply break when she hears the confirmation.

She lets the hand holding continue though. If it's the only time she'll be able to hold Emma's hand anyways, outside of town-saving magic...she wants to make the most of it.

"I get that." She lightly squeezes Regina's hand. "I...I almost asked if I could stay in here with you tonight." Emma's not looking at her, not seeing the disbelief on Regina's face. "I didn't want to push, because it's been...good, between us. And I didn't want to make it awkward. Especially," she laughs awkwardly, "not with our son down the hall, and my parents downstairs."

"It would draw some questions, yes." She shakes her head. "I didn't know that you...felt that way too."

"Like I said," she nods slowly, "For a while. It's been....building."

"So it has."

They both take quiet sips of their tea.

"Where do we go from here, then," Regina asks, setting her tea back onto the nightstand.

"I could stay? We'll deal with the awkward questions in the morning as they come." Emma's eyes are closing with exhaustion from the battle and the late hour.

"That would be...nice," Regina says, taking the cup from Emma's hand to put it on the nightstand beside her own. They settle into bed, shutting off the bedside lamp. Regina breathes a sigh of relief, laughing quietly. "I was just going to ignore it, unless you brought it up yourself. I didn't imagine we'd talk about it because you heard me moaning your name in the middle of the night."

Emma snorts out a laugh of her own, and then the light's suddenly back on, glaring into Regina's eyes.

"Wait, moan?"

"Yes, moan," she says, sitting up. "The dream you woke me up from? That certainly wasn't a cry for help, Emma."

"Holy shit." Emma's jaw is dropped, eyes wide. "Holy SHIT, that was a sex dream? And you were-"

"And I was calling your name," Regina grits out, realizing that they were nowhere near being on the same page. "and we were somehow having two very different conversations."

"So your hand- when you pulled it out from under your shirt?"

Regina's past the point of caring now.

"Fondling my own breast, dear, to the thought of you eating me." The look on her face is decidedly casual, as is her next question. "Why, what did you think I was doing?"

Emma's jaw is still flapping uselessly at the information. "...protecting your heart from your mother trying to rip it out? I thought you were- but I was wrong, okay. Wow."

"And I thought you meant that your attraction to me had been growing, but apparently you meant something else."

Emma's head is in her hands, voice muffled. "That was pretty well established from that first week I was in town, honestly."

Regina feels a hopeful spark at that, but tamps it down.

"So what were you talking about then?"

"Nothing," Emma's already out from under the covers, face a mask. "Don't worry about it."

"Miss Swan!" She goes to block the door. "You said it yourself, it's been good between us. Given the fact that we've both been sexually attracted to each other from day one and haven't done anything about it, I doubt that my little revelation will change anything between us." She summons her queenly poise, arms crossed and eyes flashing. "I showed you mine, dear, now you show me yours."

"Fine, whatever. I feel safer with you, and I thought you felt safer with me, and that's why you were calling me when you were having a nightmare." And just like that, Regina's coolness is broken, her arms dropping to her sides. "Can I go now?"

"No," Regina says softly, shaking her head. "No." She walks to Emma, the savior uncharacteristically pliant, gently pushing her back towards the bed with one hand splayed out across her chest. "You can't leave, because you haven't even let me respond." The back of Emma's legs hit the bed, and she stumbles, sitting on the bed instead of falling. "The attraction has been there for so long, Emma, but that doesn't mean that there's nothing else."

She considers her words, how much of the truth she wants to tell. She decides all of it is likely appropriate in this situation. At least as much as Emma will listen to.

"The dream was brought on by fighting Mother's army. After near death experiences, people will seek out ways to reaffirm their lives, that they survived...sex is the way I'd choose to do that. And I chose you, in my dream," she says, climbing into Emma's lap, "because you do make me feel safer. " Emma nods stiffly, her fingers twitching beside Regina's legs. "I thought I was going to die, and then you stepped in to save me. As you've done multiple times over the years- because that's what good people do, as you told me once."

Emma's hands creep tentatively up around Regina's waist, and she shivers at the touch. "Even when you knew I was the Evil Queen, knew what I'd done, you protected me, Emma. Even when you had every reason to hate me, leave me to my fate. So I suspect," she runs the back of her hand down Emma's cheek, smiling at the way that Emma's relaxing into her touch, "that I've thought of you as someone safe...reliable...dependable...for longer than you've thought those things of me. Don't you think?"

"Probably," Emma sighs out, working her hands under Regina's night shirt. "So I'm going to ask you: what now?"

"Well." She unwraps her arms from around Emma's neck, hands going for the buttons of her shirt. "I find you stunning, despite that jacket of yours, and you find me..."

"Breathtaking, despite that occasional attitude of yours," she says, helping pull off the shirt, reaching up automatically when she sees there's nothing underneath it.

"A defense mechanism and you know it. And you wouldn't like me half as much without it." She pulls at Emma's tank top, lifting the hem. "We feel safe with each other. Comfortable?" Emma nods in agreement. "Maybe even happy." Another nod. "So let's see where tonight takes us," and Emma's already licking a stripe up the center of her chest, causing the rest of the sentence to come out in a gasp, "and deal with the rest tomorrow."

**Author's Note:**

> I'm jesswritingsome on tumblr, feel free to stop in and say hi.


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